


But every tear has been a lession

by cutebutpsyco



Category: Doctor Strange (2016), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternative Universe - Canon Divergence, Avengers: Infinity War, Cloak of Levitation (Marvel), Deleted Scenes, Give the Cloak its own character tag, Infinity war Deleted Scene, M/M, Past Ironwidow and Science Bros - mentioned, Pepper Potts doesn't exist in this universe, Pre-Relationship, clothes swapping, iron Sorcerer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2020-07-26
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:28:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25518073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cutebutpsyco/pseuds/cutebutpsyco
Summary: And that was when he had to thank years and years of flying around in a suit of armour because something totally touched his shoulder as if quietly asking him to turn toward them. It was pure instinct that stopped Tony from yelling and just raised his repulsor, aiming at… Sure, the red cape which seemed to like his ass. “Wow, you’re a seriously loyal piece of outerwear, aren’t you?”
Relationships: Tony Stark/Stephen Strange
Comments: 6
Kudos: 97





	But every tear has been a lession

**Author's Note:**

> After three days of writing and deleting everything, I finally managed to have something finished which I don't totally hate. This is a concept I'd wanted to write for ages and I finally find time and inspiration to do. Also, thank you to the lovely babywarg on Tumblr.  
> Their prompt was the following: _would love any ironstrange fic of any length and any topic from you, [...] ...but if you would rather not fic, thats fine, too! [....] youre a very, very talented writer. hang in there ♥_ and this really means a LOT to me, really!
> 
> It's currently 2:34 AM here, and I'm rewatching IW (which is currently paused on the exact moment after where this fic should take place) so forgive me for every mistake you can find in this piece.  
> As always, nothing belongs to me, title from Smile by Katy Perry.

Tony couldn’t take his eyes away. There was something wickedly fascinating about the wizard flowing mid-air with what seemed to be steel needles all around him. It wasn’t the idea of the torture the Doctor was going through, not even the technology which let Squidward keeping the other man levitating, no, Tony felt a visceral repulsion for the former and didn’t care at that moment about the latter. It was something different, it was the idea of knowing more about the shiny necklace. 

Wong told him and Bruce a lot about it, but there was something, something Tony wasn’t even sure was there. Maybe it was the very thing the Stone controlled. Time was intriguing and he couldn’t phantom what a man could have done with something able to control it. 

“Later,” he whispered to himself as if he needed a reminder or a to-do list of the reasons why he was on the spaceship. First: bringing the kid back on Earth soil, done. Second: save the wizard and have them back safe in New York. How to do it? He still had to work on that part of the plan, but he was a genius for a reason. Third: ask the magic doctor everything he wanted and needed to know. And maybe his phone number. Ok, screw that, definitely his phone number. Fourth: defeat Thanos and invite the wizard over for the celebration. 

Ok, maybe he was running a little bit, but the last person who had him thinking about all the available flat surface around him has been Nat, and it was something like ten years ago (not that he didn’t have fun with Bruce until the man stayed on Earth, but Bruce had him with his brains, it was a completely different kind of attraction). 

“Back at point two,” He thought, and, somehow, that voice sounded a lot like Friday’s. Maybe she was trying to speak with him over the static noise that cut short his call from Rhodey. “Save the wizard before planning your honeymoon.”

Which would have been a lot easier if simply looking at Strange’s face didn’t let away how much in pain he was. He was clearly trying to hide it, but Tony had a certain ability to notice when somebody was doing just as much. Call it experience or call it however you prefer, he had no idea how long he could last, so he forced his brain not to think about everything that was happening around him and just focus on how to help the doctor. 

And that was when he had to thank years and years of flying around in a suit of armour because something totally touched his shoulder as if quietly asking him to turn toward them. It was pure instinct that stopped Tony from yelling and just raised his repulsor, aiming at… Sure, the red cape which seemed to like his ass. “Wow, you’re a seriously loyal piece of outerwear, aren’t you?”

Another metallic noise had him turning before the thing could give him an answer (not that Stark was really expecting for the fabric to speak or making itself comprehensible) and he knew he was glaring at the newcomer even before Peter could actually speak. “Yeah, uh, speaking of loyalty…”

He didn’t want to hear what the kid was going to say, all he wanted for was for at least one person in that mess to be safe and the fact that he let Bruce alone was enough to hunt his consciousness, but Bruce was even older than he was and he was still on Earth while the kid apparently decided to be castaway of the week. 

And there was nothing Tony could do, not at that moment, not when they were God knew how far from Earth. He couldn’t send back Peter, Friday didn’t respond and he couldn’t be sure that telling the kid back wouldn’t have injured him possibly even more. What if Squidward saw him, what if he decided to torture Peter instead of the doctor. No, no way. Maybe space wasn’t the safest place for Spider-Man to be, but he was the person who would have done everything to keep him safe, and that was supposed to be enough for the time being. Again, it wasn’t like he had any other choice either. So he just stepped back, trying to not make any sound while moving on the metal surface of the spaceship, and said: “Come on, we have a situation. So, he is in trouble, what’s your plan?”

Peter crunched down and, in an instant, the red thing followed him even if imperceptibly. Tony hated magic, deep down in his soul, but there was something in Strange’s cape which reminded him of DUM-E and he couldn’t really hate a thing so willing to follow, and maybe protect, he couldn’t tell, its human. “Ok. Did you ever see this really old movie, Aliens?”

Tony really wanted to tell something, to repeat to the kid that they couldn’t win every fight using some classic movie reference, or that his “old movies” weren’t old at all, but at that moment Strange yelled in pure pain and if that meant something was that the torture was getting harder and harder. He hoped he really got a good reading of the man, but he didn’t seem someone who could be forced into giving the Stone and the last thing Stark wanted was to witness the man’s death. He looked at the opposite wall of the spaceship and immediately understood what Peter’s idea was. 

“It’s… it’s good,” He said, and he really meant it. It wasn’t even something he thought about. If only… “But we won’t have enough time, and if we fail, I’m not sure Strange can take it longer. We need something faster.” He looked at Peter getting back into a standing position as if from there he could scan better the ship, and notice how the nanoparticles shifted with the kid’s movements rapidly adjusting over the Spider-Man suit he was wearing underneath and then an idea crossed his mind: they needed something faster, and he had the most adaptable material in the world just in his fingertips. 

“I’ll need your help,” He said, eyes going from Peter to the cape. “Both of you.” 

And, once again, before anyone could say something, he tapped against his Arc Reactor retreating the nanites inside of their housing before removing it from his chest, then he looked at Peter. “I need you to web this near the wizard’s chest,” He turned to look at the crimson outerwear a moment later, a tense smile crossing his lips. “And I’ll need a lift down from here. And then we can proceed with the Aliens plan.” 

He wasn’t surprised by the whispered: “Mr Stark, are you sure?” coming from the Spider-Kid, but what caught him off guard was to see the red thing nodding his collar at him. Good, apparently he created a potential suicidal plan fabric approved. Just what he needed. 

“Wait for my signal!” He answered to Peter and then without even having to ask, the fabric wrapped itself around Tony’s shoulder and levitated him down. Tony pretended not to notice that it was keeping him up from the metal floor, allowing him a wider range of movements which would have been impossible if his feet were against the floor. Apparently, Strange wasn’t only attractive, but was around ten centimetres taller than he was, great! What mattered, though, was that the shifting was enough for the alien to notice him and the doctor weren’t alone anymore. 

”Could end your friend’s life in an instant,” He said, and Tony really hoped Peter would understand that it was the signal before deciding to make it even more clear. At the end of the day, there was really little he could do dressed in his undersuit and a sentient cape. 

“I gotta tell you, he’s not really my friend,” He said, trying to keep his eyes on the alien and not looking for Peter or at Strange behind the non-human creature. “Saving his life is more of a professional courtesy.” 

Squidward moved a step forward, reminding Tony all over again why he hated magic so much when he started to levitate a piece of metal in his direction. What he hoped to do, Stark had no idea, but didn’t like it even a tiny bit. Just like he didn’t like when the cape dragged him a step back as if trying to keep him out of harm rage. Well, not that he didn’t like that, but the fact that his apparently new ally decided to do it without any warning was just slightly upsetting, especially when he thought about the thing being magical. 

“You saved nothing,” Will this alien even shout up or what? “Your powers are inconsequential compared to mine.”

And then he was the one with the huge ego. Tony tried not to answer like that and somehow he managed to just because at that moment he saw the withe-ish web coming from where Peter was hiding and a moment later saw a golden sparkling where Strange’s head was before. It seemed like his Arc Reactor liked the Doctor as much as the magical gourmet liked Tony, which was... good. 

“Yeah, but the kid’s seen more movies,” he snarked back, instead and an orange lighted beam streamed through the needles and hit the wall of the spaceship. Tony was almost sure that 90% of what happened was either thanks to Strange’s panic response or Friday’s basic functions, but he didn’t care, not when the only thing saving him from following Squidward in outer space was the red cape around his shoulders dragging him up and down. 

“Mr Stark,” Peter screamed. “How do we close it?!”

“The Doctor has to!” Tony had no idea if at least one of the two people who were trapped in that ship because of him heard that, but a moment later a different orange thing illuminated the entire cabin and the friendly fabric flew him back to safety.

“The Cloak of Levitation seems to like you,” Strange’s voice didn’t sound quite right, there was something different from the one he addressed him some hour (?) before in Central Park and Tony knew it wasn’t because of the helmet which he took off a moment later. It was not only more tired but even sadder. Not that the genius could blame him. 

Tony looked at him. The nanites worked just as perfectly as he thought they would around Strange’s body, but there was no trace of his Arc Reactor. Somehow, the suit took its shape around the Time Stone pendant the doctor was wearing around his neck, and one of those orange things was now engraved around it on the otherwise smooth surface of the chest plate. 

It was weird to look at somebody else wearing his suit, but it was possibly even weirder to look at his Iron Man suit in a different shape which wasn’t the War Machine was. “It helped me a lot.”

“So did your suit,” It was a whisper, as if Strange didn’t dare to admit it, or if he was denying needing any kind of help. There was something, in the blue of his eyes, so different from the one of the skies outside, that told tons about sadness and failure. 

Tony wanted to tell him something, comforting him and letting him know that even if they were in the middle of nowhere, the Stone was still with them, and that counted as a victory in his book. He wanted to be able to say that much or any other thing which would have allowed that light to leave Strange’s eyes. But they weren’t close enough, he didn’t know the man even if he suspected they were more similar than either of them thought, and so all he could do was stay silent and wait for the hell to break loose on them.

**Author's Note:**

> As always, kudos and comments are appreciated!
> 
>  **wanna say hi?** come on tumblr [@myrxellabaratheon](http://myrxellabaratheon.tumblr.com/) and [@ironstrange-is-the-endgame](http://ironstrange-is-the-endgame.tumblr.com/)  
>  **do you want a fic written by me?** Click on my Ironstrange Tumblr and follow the instruction in the pinned post.


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